


The Truth Shall Set You Free

by ereshai



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Fluff and Angst, Love Confessions, M/M, Magic, Not Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Compliant, Not Captain America: The Winter Soldier Compliant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-17
Updated: 2014-12-17
Packaged: 2018-03-01 12:50:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2773613
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ereshai/pseuds/ereshai
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clint was sick of Asgardian magic fucking with his life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Truth Shall Set You Free

**Author's Note:**

> The prompt is in the end notes to avoid spoilers.

_‘Twas the night before Christmas…_

In Avengers Tower, the Christmas season meant extensive, yet tasteful, decorations; fundraising appearances for various charities; and, on Christmas Eve, a low-key team get-together with their friends and family. That mostly consisted of Tony’s friends, a handful of SHIELD agents, and a few others.

The party wound down pretty early, to allow their guests to get home to celebrate with their families, too. Clint hung out by the Christmas tree, pretending to check the presents under it to see how many were for him (like he didn’t already know which ones were his), waving a distracted goodbye whenever someone left. If he acted the same way to everyone, no one would notice that he was trying too hard not to stalk Phil by virtually ignoring him.

It didn’t work. Phil made it a point to say goodbye to the team individually, instead of saying it to the room in general as he left. That meant Clint had to look at him and act like he didn’t want to pull Phil into his arms and never let go. Phil’s smile was warm, and his eyes were soft, and maybe Clint should just take a chance and tell him already, but Phil was already leaving.

Clint turned back to the tree. This one wasn’t professionally decorated like the hundreds of others in the Tower. It had a bunch of mismatched ornaments, either picked up from thrift stores (Steve, Bruce), taken out of storage (Clint, Natasha, Tony), or pulled out of thin air (Thor, and he hadn’t actually pulled them out of thin air, but they were from another realm, so…). Clint was examining an arrow-shaped Asgardian tchotchke – some sort of rune? – when Natasha joined him.

“I know what you’re doing,” she said before sipping wine from the glass cradled in her hand.

Clint didn’t even bother to act like he didn’t know what she was talking about. “But does Phil?”

“Hard to say.” Natasha shrugged. “He’s good at keeping things like that buttoned up.”

Clint nodded, his shoulders slumped. He could face down super-powered villains or jump off a building and live, but he couldn’t ask his friend on a date. Some superhero.

“Do you want me to find out?” Natasha’s offer was sincere, but it just made him feel worse.

“Nah, don’t do that.” He reached out and repositioned the weird ornament, trying to make it hang right. “I just wish I knew how he felt.”

“Talk to him. Not knowing is making you unhappy, and you’re starting to depress me.” Natasha leaned in and kissed him on the cheek. “Not the best way to begin a new year.”

Clint took the unspoken threat like a man, wisely deciding to call it a night before she changed her mind about giving him that much time to sort things out for himself. A week was plenty of time; all he had to do was completely change his personality and become the kind of person who talked about his feelings. Easy.

He left without much fanfare. Bruce and Betty had already gone, and Steve and Sam were working their way slowly around the buffet table again – well, Steve was, Sam was just keeping him company. Thor and Jane were having an animated discussion by the windows, and Tony, Pepper, and Rhodey were on a couch, talking quietly. Natasha and Bucky had both disappeared somewhere, which could mean they’d finally stopped dancing around each other, but could also mean that a bucket of cold water would be dumped on somebody’s head in the not-too-distant future; apparently, part of the brainwashing recovery process involved pranks. Clint vowed to check the doorways very carefully before entering any room for the next couple of days.

Clint’s Tower apartment, which took up half a floor and was bigger than his last two apartments, his temporary SHIELD quarters, and his unofficial safe house combined, was too quiet and empty. Although maybe that had more to do with the fact that he was the only one using all of that space. It wasn’t that he was lonely, not with so many friends; he felt just a little left out sometimes.

Before he could work himself into a real holiday funk, there was a knock on his door. He honestly didn’t know who he expected to find when he opened it – one of his teammates, maybe – but it wasn’t Phil.

“Hey,” Clint said, blinking in confusion.

“Hi,” Phil said. There was a smile on his face Clint could only describe as fond; not a usual Coulson smile. “May I come in?”

“Sure.” Clint stepped back, pulling the door open wider. Phil walked in, and as he passed Clint, he put a hand on Clint’s shoulder and squeezed it briefly.

His brow wrinkled, Clint closed the door. “Everything okay?” he asked as he turned, only to find Phil right behind him, still smiling. “Uhh, you’re creepin’ me out, Phil.”

“Sorry.” Phil stepped back, and they stood there, staring at each other like idiots.

“Did you need something?” Clint asked, hesitantly.

“Not really.” Clint waited, but Phil didn’t continue.

“Phil?”

Phil stepped closer again, reached out, and pulled Clint into a hug. Clint froze for a minute before returning it.

“You okay?” he asked as he pulled away.

“Better now,” Phil said, affection in his voice, and that was freaking Clint out. “I love you so much. I’m sorry I never told you before.”

Clint froze. “Maybe you should sit down,” he said through numb lips. There’s no way Clint could deal with whatever this was while standing in the middle of his living room. “Thirsty?” Oh, shit, was Phil drunk? He’d nursed one glass of Scotch throughout the party, not that Clint had been watching him obsessively or anything. That had never been enough alcohol to turn him maudlin before.

“No, thank you,” Phil said as he went to the couch.

“Great. Be right back.” Clint fled into the kitchen and poured himself a glass of water to kill some time. Something was very wrong with Phil, and Clint had to figure out what that was. Preferably without involving the rest of the Avengers; if the others saw him acting this way, Phil would be so embarrassed once he was back to normal.

Clint went back out into the living room. Phil was on the couch, leaning forward with his elbows braced on his knees, looking toward the window on the far side of the room. When he noticed Clint had returned, he sat back and patted the cushion right next to him.

“So, Phil,” Clint began, then stopped; he had no idea what he should say. He put his glass on the coffee table and sat down next to Phil. Did Phil realize how strange he was being? “Did you know you’re acting strange?” _Way to approach it delicately, Hawkeye_.

“I know. It’s really weird. I just realized that I’d never told you how I felt about you, and it seemed really important that you know, so I came back right away.”

“You just suddenly fell in love with me, and had to tell me. When did this happen?” The phrase ‘how I felt about you’ rang in his head, and he had a horrible thought.

“That statement isn’t quite accurate, but it happened about ten minutes ago.” Phil reached out and took Clint’s hand. “You believe me, don’t you?”

“I don’t know what to believe,” Clint muttered. Ten minutes ago, he’d been talking to Natasha about Phil and looking at one of Thor’s decorations on the tree. He wanted to enjoy holding hands with Phil, but he couldn’t – not when it looked like Phil had been whammied by a random Asgardian love spell. “I’m gonna get Thor up here.”

“That’s not necessary, but if it makes you feel better.” Phil let go of his hand, but he scooted closer, almost plastering himself to Clint’s side, and put his arm along the back of the couch.

“Nothing’s going to make me feel better about this,” Clint told him. He was sick of Asgardian magic fucking with his life. After pondering how to word it so that Thor wouldn’t overreact and bring everyone to his door, Clint sent him a text. Thor was pretty quick on the uptake; hopefully he’d realize that Clint had bypassed JARVIS for a reason.

While they were waiting for Thor to either respond or just show up – both were equally possible - Clint offered Phil something to eat, which he declined.

“I don’t need anything, Clint, really. I’m just happy to spend time with you. I feel like we don’t see each other often enough anymore.”

“Yeah, well, things have changed.”

“I know. I’m sorry. For everything.”

It looked like they were talking about _it_ now. Clint was much more comfortable not, actually. “You being dead sucked,” his mouth said without permission from his brain. “Finding out you were alive was good. Finding out you’d been alive for a while and never told m- us sucked.” He shrugged. “I’ve been seeing someone about it.”

“That’s good. You deserve to be happy.”

There wasn’t much Clint could say to that. He didn’t feel particularly happy, but he wasn’t unhappy, either. “Thanks.”

Phil kept looking at him and smiling. They were still sitting really close together, but Clint didn’t move away. Yeah, he was taking advantage a little bit.

There was a knock at the door. “If that’s Thor, just let him in, JARVIS.”

The door opened, and Thor walked in. “My friends, you require my help?”

Clint jumped up. “Yeah, man. What’s up with those Asgardian decorations? I think one of them cast a love spell on Phil.”

“I do not understand.”

“Look, I was talking about Phil while touching one of those rune thingies, and the next thing I know, he’s at my door, hugging me and telling me he loves me. What the hell?”

“While such things do exist, none of the runes I brought from Asgard can compel love.” Thor sounded very certain.

“What the hell, then?” Clint gestured at Phil, who spread his hands and shrugged.

Thor approached and sat down on the coffee table opposite him. “Tell me how this began, Son of Coul.”

Clint paced as Phil told Thor the details. It wasn’t very enlightening to Clint, but Thor nodded when he was done.

“Friend Clint, this rune you touched, can you describe it for me?”

“It looked like an arrow. That’s why it caught my eye.”

“Ah, then all is well. It was merely a combination of the latent magic of the season and the rune. It will fade on the morrow.”

“Great. So Phil’s gonna be in love with me for a day, and then everything will go back to normal. Thanks. Merry futzin’ Christmas.” Clint stalked toward his bedroom. “You can let yourselves out,” he said over his shoulder.

“Friend Clint, you misunderstand. That was the rune of truth. It did not make the son of Coul love you, it merely moved him to reveal the love he already feels.”

That was…huh. That changed things a little. Clint stopped and turned around. “I think me and Phil have to have a talk, Thor. Thanks for all of your help.”

“I wish joy to you both. Farewell,” Thor said, and left.

Once they were alone, Clint eyed Phil speculatively.

“I’m not telling you any classified information,” Phil said immediately. “I’m not being forced to tell you the truth, I just really, really want to.”

Clint grinned. “Damn. Does that mean you still won’t tell me why Fury calls you Cheese?”

“Not a chance.”

“I gotta apologize, Phil. It’s my fault you got hit with this,” Clint said, sobering.

“Oh?” Now that Clint wasn’t freaking out about Phil openly expressing affection, he could see that Phil was otherwise behaving like he normally would, and that settled his nerves.

“Nat and I were talking, and I, uh, I wished I knew how you felt. So this is on me.” Clint rubbed the back of his neck and looked away.

“You wanted to know how I felt because…” Phil got off the couch and walked closer to Clint, stopping just a few feet away from him.

Clint decided if Phil could come clean, even if it was helped along by Asgardian magic, he could, too. “I’ve kinda been in love with you. Um. For a few years.”

Phil stepped closer. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“Me, too.” Phil reached out and cupped Clint’s face. “Merry Christmas, Clint,” he said, and leaned in to kiss him.

**Author's Note:**

> For Feelstide 2014, prompt 59: Phil gets hit with some sort of magic and suddenly he's extremely affectionate and sweet to Clint, who thinks he's been hit with a love potion. But in reality, it's really just a spell that takes away all inhibitions and makes one extremely honest.


End file.
